


Here be Dragons

by AponiTiva



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Cassandra's Library, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-22
Updated: 2015-03-09
Packaged: 2018-03-14 15:53:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3416615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AponiTiva/pseuds/AponiTiva
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It may have been a mistake to not take Le Fay's advice and leave this world. Now not even Cassandra is sure she can save her city from this next siege of dragons, even though they claim to only want peace. How peaceful can the animals be that killed over half of the world population? That attacked New York? Either way it will be a steep learning curve for the woman known as the Dragon Slayer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Seven Pairs of Wings

The Dragons came, seven pairs of wings circling the sky too many to shoot down yet they had not attacked yet. In the next two days though it became obvious as Cassandra received more reports, a caravan was coming. They set up tents outside of the compound and the children became harder to keep in the gates as they saw the brightly colored caravan. Seven colors, seven dragons, seven tribes? It worried her brain as if there was a pattern that she couldn’t quite see yet.

Cassandra shook her head as Lamia started to speak instead pointing up to the sky picking out the different colored wings, it was coming together now. “Red, Orange, Green, Blue, Gold…” She squinted at the five up in the sky before moving to the tents. “Black, and Purple…. Lamia come here and look at this. Look at the colors of the tents.”

She pointed them out huddled in groups in a crescent moon. Three red tents in the center spiraling into the orange beside them, threading into five golden tents which seemed to be circled by two green tents. Blue and purple made up the outer edges with five each and one single black tent in the center between the red at the center of the moon shape.  

“My Liege I am unable to understand, you see a pattern I presume?” The dark haired woman spoke with a reverence and she nodded.

“It is a pattern, the walk ways between tents aren’t large enough for the dragons so they have the field to the front open not for us to walk out but for the dragons to land. Four to the front, three to the back.” A battle strategy was coming to mind as images came forward before she pushed them away.

“I believe that these are a new faction of dragons. Look at them, two are more the Chinese Style, short legs long bodies no wings…. And that one is feathered, it must be out of…”

Lamia spoke finally seeing it. “Yes my liege, I see it. They are from the Eastern band, one from the Southern, and those four are from the Western band. Yes my Lady Cassandra I see what you are speaking of, but do you truly believe that they would dare try to break through our walls?” The question now posed caused the math to flow in and her hand touched her temple while the other grabbed the railing to steady her self. Even with the tumor gone some days it was too much to run one city.

They had seven dragons, the three medium ones could easily be taken down before they managed to break through the outer wall if the attack was head on… one small, meaning young enough to where it flame would be uncertain but it still left the Red and Black, were both much too large to be taken out with anything other than magic and their tools running thin, they would have to rely on her and whatever was in the stockades.

The green was a wyvern and Cassandra knew that Lamia if given enough time could take it out if put into full magical armor. The guards would lose twenty to fifty men. It all depended on if the humans with them attacked or just let the dragons sell them out.

“I believe they would dare Guardian… for they would win. Our numbers barely make three thousand and the nearest settlement is a weeks travel from here…” Cassandra’s lips drew in a taught line, this had not been warned to her by Lady Le Fay other wise they would have prepared the city.  Built their walls higher and gathered more crops, saved their energy for when the colder months came. But now it was mid summer and her people had barely pulled in their first harvest.

Libra was no Camelot, they had needed warning and they had gotten none and now they had to face their fate. Turning she looked at her guardian judging her; where as Eve had been her older sister and constant differing opinion Lamia was more her shadow, taking her decrees and giving them life.

A twin, and she chuckled inwardly at her own little joke. Wondering if Gemini would be the next City to fall or if they would travel west towards Leo. Other parts of her wondered if Gemini had already fallen. She hadn’t been in contact with them since she had used their gate to take the not Librarian and not her Eve to the Annex almost six months ago.

Her world had changed in those months, a strong and sudden will to live causing her to nix the idea of leaving this land and displace the people of the one they ended up in. They colonies could survive, all of them, and as long as she tried. Lamia was the constant force behind her stating that she had helped reweave the thread of fate, she could do anything. Now seeing these seven dragons and the hundreds with them she wondered if she would have been better off just taking her people through the portal and away from this land.

Turning away from the balcony she ducked back under the curtain “Prepare a welcoming party to see if they can be reasoned with and send a messenger through the doorway to Leo… I believe they will be our best chance if this is to mean war.” She said not how large of a chance it was, because even if Leo got there in time it would make little difference. Mostly it was a warning to the other city that they were soon to fall.

Lamia nodded though and left her to the workroom having a large amount of misplaced faith in her ability to keep the world spinning. Cassandra lifted her hand a book flying into it. She looked at the title to be sure she had gotten it right before opening it and beginning to read aloud the stories of Camelot. Letting her mind wander away from the incident that had left her changed a year old. 

King Author’s Crown was safely tucked away inside a vault that only she could open; Excalibur was gone the sword having been used to remove her tumor. If Morgana Le Fay was to be believed though she was a descendant of Author, explaining her pure affinity to magic and the woman’s fondness of her. Cassandra had learned long ago to not believe in fairytales though because there was no such thing as a happy ending. Everything came with a price and that price was typically steep.

She thought to New York, which had fallen in her childhood, and the Library with it. They had called upon her at seventeen and told her that she would have to save not only the Library but also the world from the dragon clans who were at war.

It had been ten long hard years and even then when they had found the crown Cassandra had lost Eve. Excalibur being used by Dulaque to slay her as Cassandra was stuck in an infinite spiral of numbers as the toll of magic overwhelmed her once again. She had tried to revive the woman but the wound had pierced her heart.

She was too late for magic to even save.

Saving herself instead she had gained an ally. Her magic shoving the man over the stone and before she could even speak Lamia had killed him, her own sword pinning him into the stone through the heart as she pledged her loyalty to Cassandra. It was never a question on if she had Lamia’s loyalty, but never her love, for the snake had loved the man she killed. It was fitting really. They had both lost a half of themselves in the caves in England and came out trying to stitch themselves together so as not to lose more.

            Lamia’s reappearance hours later did not go unnoticed but she still stayed quiet facing towards the book every few minutes flipping the page disinterestedly before the woman coughed. “My Liege… the party has come back alive.” Nodding she glanced up waiting for the rest of it. “They say that the dragons wish to speak with the Librarian.” Her original title, not the Dragon Slayer, or Merlin or even the ruler of the new kingdoms though she knew that now all were tied to the title of ‘Librarian’ until the end of time.

Nodding she closed the book “Then they shall see me, who do they send as their negotiator?” As Merlin she was gifted in many forms of magic but the gift of languages was not one of them. They would have to provide a negotiator to speak for them and she would have to hope that they spoke truly.

“One of their tribesman, Jake the Black, has agreed to speak for them come tomorrow at sunrise. Lady Cassandra the messenger you sent to Leo…” Raising a dismissive hand she stopped her line of thought.

“Would not have been able to save us even if we had sent them a week ago, Leo is a colony of warriors they will save themselves. Libra will fall alone not united with its sisters if these negotiations fail.”

            The twelve colonies though united in the High City of Libra could function on their own if not united under the council, which only met once a year. The thirteen ladies and lords would meet in a cycling pattern for a week to discuss trade and their battle strategies to deal with the wild magic in the world. All thirteen of them were magic users. Cassandra split her Librarian duties between all of them to scout for potential magical artifacts that would be used and split between armories.

Thanks to information of her not Eve they had found a stash of items in the Annex along with the clippings book. Which was leading to more and faster finds of magical items to include the bridle of a kelpie, which could control any creature that it was placed upon.

            Standing she smiled at her guardian clapping “We shall ready the receiving room then… We have a dragon to impress.” Walking out the doors flew open and Cassandra was glad that the building was now clear as summer was upon them.

Her ability to walk the halls had been hindered while the halls were filled with people during the winter. It was much easier to keep all of them with in the halls to save heat during the months when it was too cold to go with out a fire. Those months were the worst in her opinion. The halls filled with people fearing that the dragons would set fire to the main halls and destroy them all.

She had tried to bring joy to the halls in the previous years using artifacts to create the northern lights on Christmas Eve. The celebration would culminate in a large feast celebrating both her guardian’s birthday but also the holiday of Christmas.

In previous years they would gather and her eyes had lit up like the children, whose hands tried to capture the colors. This past year though it had only brought sadness. The morning bringing her guilt, causing her to create the auroras again. She was the Librarian and the Leader of Libra, It was her job to put her peoples happiness above her own. Even as she sat in her chair ducking her face under her hood so none would see her tears, Cassandra knew that this was just another sacrifice that she would have to make in her service to the library.

Now though the halls were empty and full of light the windows open and airy. She felt like she could dance through the halls without hearing a single ‘my liege’ ‘the Lady Cassandra’ or ‘Dragon slayer’. It was a freeing thought but glancing back at her constant shadow she held back. Lamia would remind her that she was the High ruler of Libra and the Librarian. She had a role to fulfill and that role had never allowed her to be carefree even if her heart told her that she should be cutting cartwheels.

 

* * *

 

 

Dawn came much too soon the next morning. Lamia woke her only hours after they finished preparing the room; having draped it in red cloths displaying her sigil and the symbol of Libra. A hot bath had been prepared the night before and she had to push her guardian and along with her attendants out. Reminding them that the librarian was more than capable of bathing herself before and she still could now. She had finally been able to undress alone and sink into the water pondering what tomorrow would bring.

Now as her attendants helped her dress under Lamia’s constant watch she wished that they had more time to prepare. Finally standing she nodded her laurels settled in her hair and the elaborate braid keeping her curls to one side. While the airy fabric cascaded of the other she knew that she looked to be all of the ruler of Libra and none of Cassandra. The heavy make up covering her face settling like a mask.

“Let us go and meet our fate Guardian.”


	2. A Blackened Stone

Jacob Stone could never say that he remembered where he was exactly when the Dragons first attacked. He knew that he had been too young to do anything about it yet, but old enough to watch the tragedy happen on screen.

The Vatican was the first city to fall, and his heart sank at all of the art lost inside of it to the fires. As Europe burned on that day all he could manage to remember was the video with the high pitched screams, not coming from the people but the dragons above. How their wings moved in a dance as the city burned around them, and Jake was entranced leaning forward in his seat like it was the tiebreaker in overtime during the Super bowl.

He leaned forward enough to where everyone in his class noticed. It was at that time his entire class leaned that Jake was a genius with one simple observation. “They are talking to each other, like really talking.” His casual observation would take researchers over a year to even suspect. With those simple words his quarterback average jock persona was shattered. The news that the oldest Stone boy was a dragon sympathizer caught like wild fire and his father wouldn’t have it. Eighteen couldn’t come fast enough, and even though most of Europe and the Middle East into China were still on fire he found a boat over to the Vatican.

Standing in those stones and the rubble he had mourned the lost works before he went towards Paris. In the next few months he wandered through Europe on the tails of dragons watching and learning to imitate their cries. His arms would never work as wings though. Finding a strong hold in London he tried speaking with other to see if they had ever noticed the patterns he had. He was thrown out once his opinions that the dragons were intelligent came to light. Going to North though he found kin at Stonehenge. They too believed that the Dragons were capable of a language though none of the twenty in their ranks were even able to comprehend it. Instead they pointed him toward several caves in Germany, where they believed a dragon to be hiding.

The day that he found Orin the Black was the day that the Library found him. The simple request of his presence in New York next week coming to the top of his notes over night seemingly like magic. He had put it in his pack before making the trek up finding the caves that he had heard of all those months ago. What he had not been prepared for was the size of the dragon or how easily it hid in the shadows. His arm spread, and in a deep bow he swept them back with his head dipping forward. The past three years of observing their customs coming into play as the dragon regarded him with deep red eyes that he could only describe as garnet. The hiss echoed through the tunnels, followed by a strong rumbling, the caverns shaking around him as the dragon shifted. It unsettled him causing him to fall and shout.

In the next few moments he waited for the spout of fire or the resounding roar telling him to leave. Instead felt a warm air surround him as the dragon placed it’s snout in front of him, letting out a whine that he had only heard one before. Righting himself Jake ran a hand over the great beast, whose head was taller than he was, to back behind his eye socket brushing away a few loose scales darker than the shadows around them. “My name is Jake, Jake Stone…”

* * *

 

He slept on the floor not far from the dragon the caves warm enough even though the temperatures outside were below freezing. The days went by as his understanding of the communication and sounds skyrocketed. He soon understood that the dragon could understand him far better than Jake could ever hope to understand the other. The paper from the Library sat forgotten in his pack until after the date passed and Jake thought that it was for the best. Orin, for the dragon had finally divulged his own name, would not leave the cave even when Jake would wander off a pitiful sound was the only thing stopping him from actually leaving.

It took him a month to receive the news of New York falling, and he barely spared a breath to be thankful he had not gone there. Returning to the cave with supplies he found it empty. With a sharp intake of breath he realized that Orin had been in the same species that had destroyed not only New York but also most of the countryside of Europe. He had been living with a killer.

The next few days he packed up and left the cavern half a dozen times only to come back half a dozen more. In his heart he knew that Orin had not caused the destruction in this world. The dragon was over 300 years old, and he could gather that by the size of the caverns that he had not originally been alone in this hiding spot, though why he was now escaped him.

On the fifth day he heard the beat of wings rushing to the outdoors, he saw not only the familiar black but another dragon this time of red. The one he had remembered from the video of the Vatican, and the threatening clicks coming from it gave him no comfort as he scrambled back to the mouth of the cave. Orin’s front legs cam down stomping the ice around them; he bellowed out fire shooting it in the air getting between the two. Shooting another shot of fire at a boulder not far from the cave mouth, blackening the surface before the red dragon bowed to him. He didn’t understand what was happening, it didn’t seem to be a mating ritual and he hoped that they were not agreeing to eat him. Orin’s long neck had gotten behind him though and nudging the man forward. Jake looked back at the rock, a blackened stone… Orin had claimed him as part of his clan.

 

* * *

 

 

The three of them had left Germany. Jake travelled by land, while Orin and Pyxis went by air, going back to Stonehenge. It had been almost a year but they quickly found that the tribe had grown to forty. He was gladly welcomed back as he explained what he had learned. They tried to warm up to Orin but he cut a few out marking them with soot as the others flocked to Pyxis. It only took a month before another dragon appeared. It wings attached to its hands and another tribe of people with it. It bowed to Orin before speaking and Jake followed the conversation in his mind wondering why Orin demanded so much more respect than Pyxis.

He soon learned that Orin was larger this green dragon by at least twenty feet as they all took to the air. Orin was the oldest and there for the clan leader, as the dragon’s humans came to agree. Orin had the first pick and most discretion of which humans he claimed, only a few other than Jacob himself claimed by the beast.  The three clans feasted though and he soon learned that the Wyvern had hailed from Ireland where many of the group had also hailed. The smaller size explained by her sex, Cygnus was female and looking through her people saw that the dragon had favored female followers.

Nothing good could last though as three large dragons in the British Isles were to bring problems according to the locals. The hundred humans with them were pushed off their lands by fire and ice forcing them to travel south skirting through France and Spain to stay on the edge of Africa. They adapted to the warmth, Jake even welcoming it as his body tanned for the first time in years wearing only his pants. The armor that had been gifted to him by the Greens covering his shoulders and arms. Dragon skin was extremely rough and while they used their discarded scales for everything thick leather was the best protection against accidental disfigurement in the heat.

In the years that went by he came to understand the problems of having both female and male dragons in the clan. Cygnus was still young enough to breed and her mate had been hunted down before she had joined them. Dragons mated for life though and her cries through her laying period went unanswered. He soon learned that it was an idea the Orin took to heart. Even with the humans he would nip and spit fire at any cheater’s heels. Culling them away from his tent while the spouse stayed with them.

Dragons would pass by them overhead but the few that stopped never stayed long. They were forced away by blasts of fire and screeches as the three dragons circled the camp protecting their humans before forcing them to move miles away. Dragging them down the coast and across the desert for their protection.

When they first met the dragons of the East Jake had been entranced, their long bodies and furred manes so different, only barely remembering to bow. The mated pair stained in complimentary dark colors their manes being what mainly told them apart. The male’s mane, Serpens, a deep midnight blue that seemed black in the night while the deep purples of his mate shone brightly.

Ara and her mate brought with them their own clans separated by only a few key differences but similar in how tan their skin was. It contrasted sharply to the paler shades of the transplants, but not as dark as the people that had joined them during their stay in the desert.

They now numbered at close to two hundred, and the fires of Europe once again pushed at their backs. This time it pushed them to the ocean. The eastern dragons were unable to fly long distances meaning they had company when they commandeered a formerly military craft heading towards Mexico.

When his feet finally touched back on North America, seven years after leaving the Western Hemisphere, he remembered the letter from the Library once again. Six years had passed from when he had received it and when New York had fallen. It was estimated that the world population was only a sixteenth of what it was before the warring factions had lain fire to the Earth. Only the dragons that had left their clans had survived: the pacifists like Orion and Cygnus, the ones who had a change of heart like Ara and Serpens, and the few who had tried to fight against it like Pyxis.

Humans had learned how to harness Magic and hunt the dragons, considering them to be dangerous. Jake had learned of this when Orin lost his eye to a magical arrow in the desert, but now in the forests of Mexico they were safe. No settlements near by that had not been abandoned years previously, now only being raided now occasionally by small clans. The Panama Canal locks had been destroyed and they settled near there. The boat having beached itself on the concrete walls.

Pyxis took off suddenly one day and Jake could barely hear the keening wail of a dragon’s mating cry in the distance. He was getting older if at twenty-six he could no longer hear the ultra high-pitched frequency of a mating call. Discussing it with Orion provided him with no help. The dragon stating that he should not care about the mating calls of dragons and find a mate of his own to permanently share his bed with. The conversation was quickly forgotten though, as the clans welcomed a feathered golden dragon. Pyxis’s new mate, Vulpecula, and the egg they brought with them. It would hatch in a year’s time.

Vulpecula was much smaller than her mate. Touching her feathers Jake would enjoy conversing with her as she lay with the egg. She had brought no clan of her own though some flocked to the golden dragon creating tents in her honor. The ones from her mate’s clan dying their scarlet red tents a shade of orange that became the common symbol of their united clans. Stone stayed within Orin’s fold though. Finding himself spending most of his time outside of the tent wandering between clans as a teacher of sorts helping others understand the finer points of the language.

It filled his days but his nights were long and filled heavily with Orin’s words. He knew that he should marry, there were many people in the tribe he could choice from, their numbers had only increased over time. He felt no need to take these women back to his bed. Aware of the increasing number of stares as he would spend the day with the dragons he had started to wear a shirt again. It that had been salvaged from a village the grey fabric tight over his chest. It did little to stop the stares.

Fornax’s birth was much celebrated as the hatchling broke from its shell and his color praised as a perfect blend of his parents. The coppery brass a surprising compliment to the orange tents. Seven dragons, Seven colors. And, as the people of the united clan became Fornax’s clan, it seemed to pique their interest that Fornax chose to ride on Jake’s shoulders once he had been able to leave the nest instead of one from his own clan.

On midsummer a year and a half later the sky lit up and Jake could say nothing about it other than to agree with Orin that is was unnatural. His hand rested against the dragon on his good side watching the colors dancing til early morning and returned to his personal tent under the canopy of Orin’s clan. The next morning the mysterious paper yet again appeared, though he swore that it had been used long ago to draw on. Reading it to Orion, the dragon expressed his concern, before saying that they must find this ‘Librarian’.

And so, with Orin’s orders, the seven clans moved North with their dragons to find this Librarian. Encountering an explanation to what the lights had been early on. Magic was now wild and in the world. Artifacts that had been left long ago were now more powerful than ever. The year of travel showed them many different things as they skirted the settlements in the former United States first traveling to New York, or as it was now called Sagittarius. Finding that the Library that had called to him was now gone and the Librarian the ruler of the city Libra. Rumors of her magic ran wild as they said she was the slayer of dragons. Orin still insisted that she should be spoken with for the Librarian was suppose to bring balance to the world and the magic with in it.

A year later, just a few days past high summer, they found the city. Setting up their tents Jacob waited. He was chosen by the dragons to represent them and state that they wished for peace. The Negotiator, they called him.

He looked down at his clothing and deciding it would do before leaving his tent. Fornax had refused to leave his shoulders like a cat though he was too young to be able to speak for any of the other dragon’s it comforted him as he was lead past the red bridge and into the town walls enveloping him. He had would not be facing the Dragon Slayer alone, for he too was a dragon in many ways.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So you guys are all caught up on the basics of Jake’s life and got a bit of a history lesson. Kudos to whoever figures out what each Dragon is named after and what they all have in common… Not like I wont tell you next chapter why they are named what they are…  
> God this chapter felt like an info dump that I wrote in… 5 hours. Yeah lots of information for everyone; probably should post up my notes on the dragons and Timeline for everyone… If you ask for it (nicely) I will.  
> Chapter 3 is half written now, along with a few key scenes for chapter 4. Having No Internet is making me productive.
> 
> Also sorry for the delay, my Mom is having surgery and I worked two weeks in six days so I could be off for her recovery.

**Author's Note:**

> Yay Cassandra not giving up to the mean old dragons ruining the world. Eve and Flynn really gave the girl a morale boost. You guys will get to learn more about the cities as the chapters go on, and next week (Yes I am evil) you will have chapter two which features none of Cassandra. Also sad Cassandra…. Taking on the Librarian mantle at 17 has changed her a lot, made her more mature.


End file.
